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In North Carolina, Beliefs Clash on Marriage Law

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — North Carolina is as good a place as any and possibly better than most to explore the often contradictory sentiments at the heart of the same-sex marriage debate.

On Tuesday, the voters in this state went to their polling stations and, by a landslide margin, elected to join the voters in 30 other states in enshrining a ban on same-sex marriages in the State Constitution. The next day, President Obama, perhaps buoyed by repeated polls showing support for same-sex marriage nationally, announced his personal support for it.

And in the days after that, people here and elsewhere concluded that, when November rolls around, this public disagreement between the president and a large majority of voters in this state on a burning social issue will not make much difference at all.

“To be quite candid, I would say probably a small factor with equal push each way,” is how State Representative Paul Stam, the Republican majority leader in the state’s House, put it.

But there are cultural facets, too, and they go deeper, reflecting that for many voters, gay rights are not an all-or-nothing matter, but something more nuanced.

“Someone’s religion teaches them to condemn homosexuality, and yet they are in some kind of relationship, whether a family member or close friend” who is gay, said the Rev. Jasmine Beach-Ferrara, a North Carolina native and the executive director of the Campaign for Southern Equality, a gay rights group based in Asheville. Reconciling that, she said, “doesn’t typically happen in the time frame of a ballot initiative.”

It came as a surprise to many on both sides that the vote was so decisive in North Carolina, where a poll in March by Elon University, a liberal arts university in the state, found that two-thirds of residents supported some legal recognition of same-sex couples. The state also has a moderate reputation and is the site of this year’s Democratic Convention.

But North Carolina has long been at peace with its seeming inconsistency, electing a liberal like Terry Sanford and a conservative like Jesse Helms to serve in the Senate at the same time.

Social and religious conservatism and economic populism have historically gone hand-in-hand in a state that, for many decades, consisted largely of small farms and mill towns. Thus in a state that became known for first-rate universities, it was illegal to buy a cocktail for most of the 20th century.

“If you look at all the progressive politicians in this state, most of them have used religious talk in their speeches in a way that would startle a Northern politician,” said Rob Christensen, a columnist for The News and Observer in Raleigh and the author of “The Paradox of Tar Heel Politics.” “Yes, it’s progressive in a lot of ways, yes, it’s moderate on racial issues, but at the same time it’s still socially conservative.”

Those strains are increasingly diverging, as transplants move in and the urban areas expand, as seen in Tuesday’s vote. Most cities and college towns voted against the marriage ban, with corporate leaders and even some Republican politicians from urban areas speaking openly against it.

But from the mountain hamlets to the tobacco towns on the coastal plains, the amendment was deeply popular. In all, 93 of the state’s 100 counties voted for it, most by wide margins.

Photo

“I don’t believe in same-sex marriage for religious reasons,” said Garrett Snuggs, 32, a barber in Wadesboro, N.C. “But hey, whatever happened to the separation of church and state?”Credit
Ozier Muhammad/The New York Times

To the disappointment of some gay rights advocates here, who wanted to see a more candid debate, the main argument advanced by the opposition was that the amendment was simply bad law and would produce unintended consequences for children and unmarried couples.

“In the rural counties, it’s just such a visceral issue,” said W. Glenn Jonas Jr., chairman of the religion department at Campbell University, which is affiliated with the Baptist Church.

Evangelical Protestant leaders declared the choice unambiguous. Days before the vote, the Rev. Billy Graham, a native and one of the most respected figures in the state, took out a full-page advertisement in 14 newspapers.

“At 93, I never thought we would have to debate the definition of marriage,” he said in it. “The Bible is clear — God’s definition of marriage is between a man and a woman.”

For the most part, black religious leaders were also unequivocal, and remained so even after the president declared his personal approval of same-sex marriage on Wednesday.

“I’m very clear on that one,” said the Rev. Barrington B. Ross, pastor at Pearson Chapel A.M.E. Church in Yanceyville. “He’s the leader of the free world, but I won’t change my view on marriage.” Mr. Ross said that he was still a supporter of the president, and that they would simply have to agree to disagree on this one.

State residents who opposed the ban, meanwhile, have spent days defending the reputation of North Carolina to disdainful same-sex marriage supporters. There have been calls for the Democratic Convention to be moved from Charlotte, jokes about the state have circulated on Twitter and a Facebook page dedicated to North Carolina tourism became a free-for-all of North Carolina bashing.

While some residents pointed out that most states had passed amendments similar to this one, others lamented that outsiders — and even people who live in the liberal enclaves within the state — just did not appreciate the difficult morality of the issue for a population that remains deeply religious.

Many of the people who voted against same-sex marriage “genuinely and honestly believe it violates their fundamental religious beliefs,” said Gary Pearce, a former adviser to Jim Hunt, a Democrat who was the state’s longest serving governor and who would often describe his progressive policies in the language of faith. “They don’t really want to hurt people.”

Those particular religious convictions are not necessarily shared by the state’s younger generation. State Representative Thom Tillis, a Republican and speaker of the House, even acknowledged as much several weeks ago, when he said that the amendment would probably be repealed in 20 years.

As the younger voters shift in their opinions, more gay people are also willing to live openly in parts of the country where they would not have done so before, adding further moral complications to those firmly opposed to same-sex marriage.

“One of the things that’s been a factor is they’ve become aware in these little towns and everywhere else of gay people they know, especially in their own families,” said Hastings Wyman, the founding editor of the Southern Political Report, a nonpartisan newsletter.

Mr. Wyman, who is gay and spent several years working in Republican politics in his home state, South Carolina, including as a legislative aide for Senator Strom Thurmond, talked about his experiences among his own family and friends from growing up.

“It just kind of eats away at the general public custom,” he said. “It’s just harder for them because it puts them at odds with other people they know.”

Robbie Brown contributed reporting from Atlanta.

A version of this article appears in print on May 12, 2012, on page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: An Issue of Gay Rights, but Not a Simple One. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe